The Last Moments
by Minor God
Summary: A bit of Ted and Ralph angst. Suicide warning. Please read and review! It's experimental.
1. Chapter 1

A/N: Complete angst. Please tell me how it comes across, so I know whether it's worth doing again. 

Disclaimer: I disclaim.

* * *

I can't meet my eye in the mirror; or in the reflective guild-plated detritus crammed all around me. This is supposed to be my home, but none of this belongs to me – I don't want it. When I was a child, I used to close my eyes and pretend I lived in a little cottage far away from this filth and wasted grandeur, with a family who loved me.

With you.

The fantasy that carried me through all those years has slipped through my fingers, because you don't love me, do you? I try to convince myself you don't know how your presence and your voice make my heart race and my head spin: how you set all my senses alight. But you must know, because I've tried so many times to call out to you. And you've never so much as said my name. "Sir"? What is that? That's not a name, it's not a person; it's a denial of a person.

Can you truly know what pain I live in, aching for a second every day to spend with you? For twenty years, I have never thought of anything but my love for you – the need to feel your skin on mine corrodes my every waking thought until I'm an inarticulate idiot. I avoid all human contact in hopeless fidelity to you, turning down lover after lover and endless chances at happiness.

I'm thirty-five, Ted. I feel my age, in my swollen joints and my lonely heart.

That's why I have to end it. I've lain here on my bed drinking for days and nights and you haven't come to see me – nor has anyone else. I clearly repulse you all, you ingrates. If you had only given me one chance, I could have been like you. I could have been your friend. I could have loved you for the rest of your life.

I shall die free. In my last imagined moments, I shall make love to you in a time and place where you love me. At last my body will clash against yours and I will feel like a man.

I hope you know that I did this for you, Ted. My only love. Will you see me drained of my life's blood in a violent red sea? Will you love me better for leaving you?

I'll use the knife my father cut me with all those years ago. Do you remember the scars you saw and were too indolent to ask me about?

Oh darling. I don't mean to hurt you. I have to leave.

The veins are open, my life weeps away. I begin to feel warm, as I conjure your soft, loving weight upon me; imagine I hear your voice adoring me. It feels so real. Perhaps you could love me... I don't know, my mind is swimming in the descent. I have to know! I try to pull myself away from the bed, but I realise, as though for the first time, that I am minutes away from death. Soon I shall be nothing more than a pile of mangled atoms and I'll never see you again.

Oh Ted, please forgive me! There's nothing I can do but lie here crying.

I can feel the darkness.

* * *

"Oh dear God," said one man.

"Oh Jesus Christ!" said the other. "Mr Mayhew? Mr Mayhew? I never thought he'd really do it, why the hell did we never see the signs?!"

"That poor man. That fucking stupid child, why would he do this to himself? Why did he do it?"

"You know how he was, Ted, he was mad as a hatter."

"He was _sick_, he could have been helped! Oh my poor little boy! I've known him since he was born, you know."

"Don't cry, Ted. The ambulance is here."

"What the _fuck_ good will that do him? He's gone. My God, what a waste, why did it have to happen?!"

"You need to calm down, there's no helping him now. Come on, don't get hysterical."

"Don't get fucking hysterical, a young man has lost his life!"

"Wait! Ted, look! He's waking up!"


	2. Chapter 2

I can feel… I think I have survived. The pain is still ripping through my arms, but I feel calm. I'm lying somewhere warm and soft. As my consciousness spins through the room, spiralling down towards my body, I begin to discern the noise around me – there is a clinical beeping from a machine somewhere in the room, distant footsteps, voices; someone is crying.

My hands twitch to grab at the duvet beneath me.

"Ralph! Are you awake?!"

_Yes, I'm awake, Ted._ My eyes split open angrily to see him curled up in a chair beside this bed, but when he meets my gaze, I feel hollow. He looks different to the cold, indifferent man I wasted my love on: he seems older, weaker, more vulnerable… In fact, he looks sick.

"My darling!" he cries. His voice breaks. Tears are running down his unnaturally white face. "You're alive! Praise be to God!"

"Ted." I hear my own voice frail with emotion, as though it's reaching out to him. His hand strokes down my face softly while his crying becomes more desperate. "I thought you were gone," he says, between gasps. "You've been here for two days without waking up; you've had two blood transfusions! Oh my God, I thought you'd gone!"

Every fibre of my body hurts: every muscle aches violently, every bone and nerve. The beeping of the machine is my own heart-beat, which quickens as I look at him.

"Why did you do it?" Ted is weeping. "How could you do this to me? I've been here for thirty-eight hours praying for you and-"

"You did this to me," I say. He falls silent. My anger has stirred up again, and the sadness on his craggy old face satiates me. Glittering dark eyes look at me, feigning innocence. I try to pull myself up from the bed, but my arms collapse. Hatred erupts through my mouth. "You vile old _bastard_. You've never given a thought to whether I lived or died before but now you know that I can't live without you and you've come here to clear your name." I feel a little stronger now.

His brilliant dark eyes narrow to hateful slits. "I know you're very ill, Ralph, so I won't take that personally. But before you say anything else, I want you to know three things. The first is that I have just lived through the worst days of my whole life. That anything could hurt you this badly is literally my worst nightmare; but you're right, it's something I never treated as seriously as I should have done, because I was aware that you were falling ill again and I was too cowardly to say anything to you. Masculine arrogance I suppose…" His voice falters with tears. "I was so scared to say something that wouldn't help and- feel like I'd failed you. Secondly, I would never do anything, _anything_ at all to hurt you. I can't describe how much I long to protect you from everything. You know sometimes I look at you and I see the tiny newborn child I once held in my arms. And I want to protect you."

There is a long silence, during which he reaches out to stroke my arm.

"Do you know that a long time ago, when you last went into hospital, I could have raped you in cold blood? You were strapped to the bed and you had your mouth open. God knows, I thought about it. But I couldn't, because of the third thing, which is that I love you very much."

I try to speak, but he touches my lips with one finger.

"I'm so sorry. I won't ever let you feel so alone again. Even if you can't find it in your heart to love me after the pain I've put you through, I'm going to be the friend you've always deserved. I've never been able to tell you how much I've loved you all these years, because when I fell in love with you, you were only a child and I couldn't live with myself. But now I know what the rejection did to you… Christ in Heaven, I'm going to care for you for as long as I live."


End file.
